Computer locking up

For a good amount of time now, my computer has been locking up. At first I thought I knew the problem, but after I fixed it, my computer still continued to lock up. I'm assuming it's a problem in the registry, and I downloaded RegCleaner from this website. However, for some reason I'm unable to run RegCleaner, it opens up as a process in Task Manager, however, the actual program does not open. I tried restarting the computer and I was able to run RegCleaner, but after a minute or so, it suddenly closed. This made me believe that I had a virus that was toying with my registry and closed RegCleaner because it was a threat, but Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware didn't pick anything up. What do I do?

 

Welcome to Major Geeks!

What exactly happens when your computer "locks up"?

Have you changed any hardware recently?

Burrell

 

No, I haven't changed any hardware. And by locking up, I mean my computer continuously freezes at random moments.

 

I've went into Safe Mode, it never froze while I was in it, but I can't exactly go by that. So far today my computer hasn't frozen yet, but that doesn't mean it won't.

 

I'm also interested in an answer to this question.

1) my computer freezes in the sense that it just stops doing anything, you might think it is just while whatever program I have called up is loading (because eventually the program comes back into action and again eventually actually starts) however, that is NOT normal for Vista.:mad

2) I also downloaded RegCleaner (tried it a few years ago - boy, has it improved, I really like it now:heart), it actually helped to speed up my computer and ended the freezing thing. UNTIL I restarted, after that RegCleaner boots only in the task manager - must be going somewhere in the background but it is of no use there - AND my machine is back to freezing on things.

3) I noticed that there are a lot of programs running (processes) that I don't want. These seem to load automatically and they are not in any of the "start up program" lists. They must be slowing down the machine, but I don't know how to stop them from loading. I have a CPU meter on the desktop, according to it, there must be an enormous amount of extended activity on this machine at start-up. :hyper

 

Copy and paste your problem's into your own thread, then i will help you.

 

While in safe mode, it is worth looking to see if an automatic update happened just before you had this proble. If it did , unintalling that update could help.
It is also worth running a hard disc check, as I have seen laptops do this (freeze on startup) when the hard drive was getting a bit iffy.
As plodr says, video drivers can be a pain, and if one was included as an update, it could be worth rolling back the driver, while in safe mode.